This post contains affiliate links.
If you follow me on Instagram, you probably have seen my journaling posts starting toward the end of 2020. I had always wanted to keep a journal. I wrote in a diary for years in elementary and middle school, but struggled to keep up with even a Some Lines a Day journal over the past couple of years. I’d always have to go back and catch myself up months at a time. It was really hard for me to get into a groove!
I follow lots of inspiring IGers who keep journals. Whether it’s for reading, or planning/bullet journaling, I envied their journals! They were so cute and custom and I loved the thought of having something creative that was all mine to look back on once the year was done. For at least the last two years I’ve had an urge to start a journal of my own and then… gave up.
The #1 thing that held me back from starting/continuing a journal was my lack of artistic abilities. I have never been good at hand lettering, or drawing, or anything artsy. I had been letting that hold me back for years. This year I decided… no more! This journal was HAPPENING. One of the most important things was that I was also going to document my journaling journey for others. Especially those who, like me, felt woefully inadequate when it came to their artistic ~skills~. There aren’t a lot of average journals out there for the world to see! So I’m sharing mine!
Once I decided I was doing this, I went on my IG and shared a bunch of inspo I was seeing and decided on the sorts of things I wanted to document. I was seeing so many different types of journals, and I wanted mine to be a hodgepodge of everything. A little bit scrapbook/memory keeping, a little bit book journal, a little bit journaling and reflection. I also wanted to attempt New York Times collages (an idea I first saw from @alltheradreads on IG).
The supplies.
I picked up my journal from Hobby Lobby for $5. I also found a great one on Amazon! It has thick paper and a dotted grid. I also grabbed some card stock and two sided tape. Ya girl is also a huge stationery hoarder… I had tons of washi tape, stickers, pens, etc. ready to go! I keep all of my stationery/journaling supplies semi-organized on this cart… here’s a pic of it:
The first week I worked on it almost every day. Now I usually sit down with it once or twice per week, depending on if I have an idea or not. It definitely has come in waves but I’m proud of myself for sticking with it for one whole month!
My journaling progress.
Here are some pics of my favorite spreads and descriptions of what they are/how I’m going to use them!
I used the first pages to make a spread of my 2021 goals! I think it’s important to have them written down somewhere you’ll see them frequently! This allows you to check in on progress/reassess throughout the year.
To make these numbers I chose a font on my computer and then printed them and cut it out! I traced over and colored them in with black marker.
When The Office left Netflix January 1st, I made sure to make a spread about it! I printed pics from the internet and wrote a journal entry about the show itself and why it’s important to me. I am planning to do spreads like this for other shows/movies we watch this year! This is a perfect example of the kind of journaling/scrapbooking/memory keeping I had in mind for this project.
Obviously I have my reading goal for 2021 listed here! I am going to color boxes a different color depending on the month I read the book. Hopefully this will allow me to see what months I read a lot and what months I fell behind! Just an interesting way to document my books read throughout the year.
To make the title for this page I traced a font on my computer and then went over it in marker!
I also have the Popsugar Reading Challenge and the Bad Bitch Book Club book prompts taped into my journal as well! Will be updating them as I read books that fit the prompts this year.
I also have a backlist bingo challenge and an audiobook challenge!
Really important for me to document gratitudes/things that make me happy! This is the space I’m going to use to do that. It was also really easy to draw, trust me haha.
FYI: this was not an original idea!
I’m excited to do a spread like this each month to reflect/share some favorite things from the month! I think I’m going to switch it up a bit for February but I was pretty happy with how this January spread turned out.
I actually messed this page up a bunch and had to improvise… this is what came of it!
These are my fav spreads for now/the ones I have pics of. I am going to keep sharing on IG (make sure you’re following me!) and I’ve even done a short flip through earlier this month on YouTube (hey, remember I have a YT channel??)
If you’re doing a journal, let me know how it’s going in the comments! I can’t wait to continue to show my journaling progress with you all 🙂
